The year 2016 has been a turbulent year to say the least as the world watched the world’s largest economy elect Donald Trump as the next president of the United States, and the United Kingdom exit the European Union.
US President Barrack Obama will make his farewell appearance as critics look at the lasting effect of his presidency. The end of the Obama administration will leave a profound impact over the upcoming year.
Trump is determined to erase the policies of Obama, while his handling of relations with Russia will be seen with keen interest and scrutiny amidst accusations that Russia hacked and impacted US election systems.
Many leaders took off from the world stage notably Prime Minister David Cameron after the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. The impact of the Brexit vote will affect the UK economy as it is implemented in 2017 posing more challenges for Theresa May.
The brutal war in Syria ravaged on into its sixth consecutive year as the forces loyal to President Al-Assad recaptured the city of Aleppo, while in Iraq the Islamic State seems contained as the military launched an operation to retake Mosul. A fragile ceasefire has been brokered in Syria by the year end by Russia and Turkey, but the over complicated war is far from over.
These crises in the Middle East and Africa led to massive influx of refugees across Europe, which struggled to cope with them and now threatens the fabric of European politics and culture. Many countries like Germany welcomed them, while the emergence of far-right groups saw scathing opposition.
As questions were raised over the security of Europe, the continent witnessed several terrorist incidents such Brussels airport attack, Bastile Day attack in Nice, France and the Christmas attack in Berlin, Germany. Turkey which also faced an attack on the Istanbul, also faced a thwarted coup attempt against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
2016 was a great year for the sports world as the Summer Olympics were held successfully in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The US topped the medals table. Swimmer Michel Phelps win his record 22nd gold medal, while Jamaican Usain Bolt sprinted his way to his third consecutive gold medal.
Portugal won the Euro Cup for the first time, while Leicester City emerged from oblivion for a shocking win in the English Premier League. On the tennis field, Britain’s Andy Murray ended the year as the men’s world number one, while Angelique Kerber won two grand slams and the top ranking.
The entertainment world saw many notable deaths including David Bowie, Leonard Cohen, Prince, Carrie Fisher, George Michael and Debbie Reynold. The start of the year also saw Leonardo DiCaprio finally won an Oscar Award, while Game of Thrones dominated the television screens.
There were many scientific breakthroughs from the Solar Impulse which circled the world without fuel, first pictures of dwarf planet Pluto, self-driving cars, delivery drones, and new smartphones.
The following are some of the most defining moments of the years from across diverse sections across the world. – Happy New Year!!!
US President-elect Donald Trump arrives at the New York Hilton Midtown in New York on November 8. Trump stunned America and the world by winning the election against Hillary Clinton
US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton makes a concession speech after being defeated by Republican President-elect Donald Trump, as her husband and former President Bill Clinton looks on November 9.
Donald Trump listens as Hillary Clinton answers a question from the audience.
Khizr Khan, the father of a Muslim American soldier who was killed serving in Iraq, took aim at Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, at the Democrat Convention.
Blunt-spoken retired Marine Corps General James Mattis nicknamed ‘Mad Dog’ has been named defense secretary of the United States by President-elect Trump.
President Barack Obama meets with President-elect Donald Trump iin the Oval Office of the White House in Washington.
Hillary Clinton speaks about the FBI inquiry into her emails during a campaign rally in Daytona Beach, Florida, October 29, 2016.
Demonstrators protest against US President-elect Donald Trump in front of Trump Tower on November 12 following days of previous protests, even as Trump appeared to back away from the fiery rhetoric that propelled him to the White House.
David Cameron addresses the medal outside 10 Downing Street on July 13, before going to Buckingham Palace to tender his resignation to The Queen.
Nigel Farage poses for photographers as he leaves a polling station on June 23, as Britain voted to leave the European Union.
British Prime Minister Theresa May speaks to the media outside number 10 Downing Street, London.
British MP Jo Cox, who won election for Labour in 2015, was fatally shot and stabbed outside the library in Birstall, West Yorkshire, on 16 June.
Members of the royal family, including Queen Elizabeth watch a flypast on the balcony of Buckingham Palace. The Queen celebrated her 90th birthday this year.
Britain’s Prince George with the family pet dog, Lupo, in mid-July at his home in Norfolk.
President Barack Obama welcomes Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for a state dinner at the White House in Washington on March 10, 2016.
President Barack Obama with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe after they laid wreaths at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Obama became the first sitting President to visit the site of the first nuclear explosion.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and U.S. President Barack Obama (L) participate in a wreath-laying ceremony aboard the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
Obama awards his final Presidential Medals of Freedom, during a ceremony at the White House, among other to Bill Gates.
President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama arrive at the inauguration of the first National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington.
Cuban President Raul Castro (right) raises US President Barack Obama’s hand during a meeting at the Revolution Palace in Havana on March 21
Air Force One seen carrying President Barack Obama in Havana, as he became the first sitting US President to visit the island in fifty years.
People watch a military vehicle transport the ashes of Fidel Castro in Havana, Cuba.
Cuba’s President Raul Castro salutes after placing the box containing the ashes of Cuba’s former President Fidel Castro who died on Nov 25 aged 90.
Former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff (centre) greets supporters on her arrival at the Canoas air force base on September 6 after leaving the governmental palace in Brasilia on her way home to Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul state
People watch from a terrace in the favela Mangueira as fireworks explode over the Maracana stadium during the opening ceremony of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro on August 5
The wreckage of a plane that crashed into the Colombian jungle with Brazilian soccer team Chapecoense onboard near Medellin, Colombia.
Pallbearers place Muhammad Ali’s casket in the hearse as it prepares to begin a procession through his hometown. The legendary boxer passed away on June 3.
A banner stating “We Love You Muhammad” is displayed as well-wishers touch the hearse during the funeral procession through Louisville, Kentucky
Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman is escorted by soldiers during a presentation in Mexico City on January 8, 2016. El Chapo famously escaped from prison until he was recaptured.
A Syrian refugee gives thanks to God as he arrives in an overcrowded dinghy on the Greek island of Lesbos .
A child strapped with his mother walks with other migrants and refugees after crossing the Macedonian border into Serbia, near the village of Miratovac, on January 29
Migrants and refugees wrapped in survival foil blankets rest next to rescue members aboard the Topaz Responder ship, run by Maltese NGO Moas and the Italian Red Cross, after a rescue operation early morning on November 5 off the coast of Libya
“Afghan Girl” Sharbat Gula, whose 1985 photo in National Geographic became symbolic, was arrested and deported for illegally living in Pakistan.
Afghan five-year-old and Lionel Messi fan Murtaza Ahmadi wears a plastic bag jersey as he plays football in Jaghori district of Ghazni province on January 29
Model Salwa Elrashid models a ‘burkini’, was designed as a swimsuit for Muslim women. The French authorities misunderstood and banned the burkini turning it into a symbol of division.
Some of the 21 Chibok schoolgirls released by Boko Haram pose during a group photograph with President Muhammadu Buhari .
UN Secretary general Ban Ki-moon (left) and Chilean President Michelle Bachelet (centre) look at Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos (right) at the end of the signing ceremony of an historic peace agreement between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in Cartagena, Colombia, on September 26
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos receives the Nobel Peace Prize 2016 in Oslo, Norway.
Musician Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for Literature “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.
Police stand in front of the truck which ploughed last night into a crowded Christmas market in the German capital Berlin, Germany, December 20, 2016.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel inspects the Christmas market near Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in Berlin a day after the attack.
Police officers stand near a van, with its windscreen riddled with bullets, that ploughed into a crowd leaving a fireworks display in the French Riviera town of Nice on July 14.
A man wrapped in a Belgian flag holds a candle as people gather at a makeshift memorial in front of Brussels’s Stock Exchange on Place de la Bourse on March 24, two days after a triple bomb attack on Brussels’ airport and Maelbeek metro station killed 31 people and wounded 300 others
Members of the New Jersey State Police salute a casket with the body of slain Dallas police Sgt. Michael Smith. Five policemen were shot dead on July 7 in Dallas, Texas.
A Los Angeles Metro Police officer stands watch on the UCLA campus, after a murder-suicide killed two people shutting down the campus for two hours.
Police continue to investigate a shooting at the Pulse night club in Orlando. The mass shooting in which 49 people were killed was the worst incident in US history.
A view of the flooded river-side of the River Seine near the Eiffel tower in Paris. Some areas reportedthe worst flooding seen in a century.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shakes hands with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (L) during the funeral of former Israeli President Shimon Peres.
Prince William, Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, Prince George and Princess Charlotte (R) arrive at a children’s party in Canada.
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch, 88, married former supermodel Jerry Hall.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is the most powerful person in the world, according to the latest ranking from Forbes.
Russian President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with American actor Steven Seagal as he is presented a Russian passport.
Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov makes a speech at an art gallery shortly before he was shot in Ankara, Turkey on Dec 19.
Former Prime Minister of Portugal Antonio Gutteres is confirmed as the next Secretary General of the United Nations.
A photographer holds his picture of the Temple of Bel, taken on March 14, 2014, in front of the remains of the historic temple in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra on March 31. It was destroyed by Islamic State in September 2015.
Forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad stand inside the Umayyad mosque, in the government-controlled area of Aleppo.
Omran, a four-year-old Syrian boy covered in dust and blood, was pictured in an ambulance after being rescued from the rubble of a building hit by an air strike in the rebel-held Qaterji neighbourhood of Aleppo on August 17
A displaced Iraqi girl, who fled the Islamic State stronghold of Mosul, stands at Khazer camp, Iraq.
UNHCR Special Envoy Angelina Jolie reacts as it rains during a news conference during her visit to Syrian refugees in the Bekaa valley, Lebanon.
A boy stands near a damaged building after an airstrike yesterday in the rebel held Douma neighborhood of Damascus.
Buses are seen parked in Aleppo’s government controlled area of Ramouseh, as they wait to evacuate civilians and rebels.
A woman and her children stand in the ruins of battle-damaged house in the Kurdish town of Silopi, in southeastern Turkey, on January 19 as Turkey wages war against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)
Protesters gather in Tehran against the execution of prominent Shia cleric Shieikh Nimr in Saudi Arabia.
Mourners attend funeral of Abdul Qader Helal, the mayor of Sanaa Yemen, who was killed by an apparent Saudi-led air strike.
People look at a crater caused by a Saudi-led coalition air strike at the yard of a hospital operated by Medecins Sans Frontieres in the Abs district of Hajja province, Yemen on August 16, 2016.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko lays flowers during a commemoration to mark thirty years of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster.
Nuns belonging walk past a large banner of Mother Teresa who was canonized and declared a saint by the Vatican.
Russian President Vladimir Putin visits the Tavrida national youth educational forum in Bakal Spit, Crimea.
People take over a tank near the Fatih Sultan Mehmet bridge during clashes with military forces in Istanbul on July 16
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is emotional after attending the funeral of a victim of the coup attempt in Istanbul on July 17.
Seven-year-old Bana al-Abed, whose Twitter account gave a tragic description of the bombing of Aleppo in Syria, met Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at his palace in Ankara.
Fireworks explode over participants in a mass dance, a day after the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea party wrapped up its first congress in 36 years, in Pyongyang, North Korea.
Pope Francis walks through Auschwitz’s notorious gate with the sign “Arbeit Macht Frei” (Work sets you free) during his visit to the former Nazi death camp in Poland.
This NASA’s photo of Pluto was made from four images from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager, taken when the spacecraft was 280,000 miles (450,000 kilometers) away from the dwarf planet.
Professor of Planetary Astronomy Mike Brown speaks in front of a computer simulation of the probable orbit of ‘Planet Nine’ (yellow) in California. The solar system may host a ninth planet that is about 10 times bigger than Earth and orbiting far beyond Neptune.
John Glenn, seen waving here in 2012, and the first American astronaut to orbit the Earth, died on Dec 18.
The “supermoon,” the largest full moon of the year, is partly covered by clouds in Chiang Mai, Thailand.
Solar Impulse 2, seen here in Abu Dhabi, become the first sun-powered airplane to circumnavigate the world without a drop of fuel.
Journalists taste test the plant based hamburgers during a media tour of Impossible Foods labs and processing plant in Redwood City, California.
A prototype of Google’s own self-driving vehicle is seen during a media preview of Google’s current autonomous vehicles.
Usain Bolt of Jamaica looks at Andre De Grasse of Canada as they compete in the men’s 100m semifinals at the Rio Olympics August 14, 2016
Novak Djokovic celebrates with the trophy after defeating Andy Murray of Britain in the French Open final.
Portugal’s captain and forward Cristiano Ronaldo holds up the winners’ trophy in the Euro 2016 final football match between France and Portugal at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, on July 10
Leicester City celebrate with the trophy on the bus during the parade. Leicester shocked the football world after winning the English Premier League.
Germany’s Angelique Kerber kisses the trophy as Serena Williams of the U.S. claps after Kerber won the Australian Open tennis tournament at Melbourne Park, Australia, January 30, 2016.
Former world number one Maria Sharapova was given a two-year ban after positive test for the banned drug meldonium at the Australian Open.
San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick, seen applauding as they honor military service members, gained criticism and support after he refused to stand for the national stadium.
Michael Phelps, most decorated Olympian of all time with a total of 28 medals, poses with his gold medal in Rio de Janeiro.
Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe takes part in the flag handover ceremony. The 2020 Olympics will be held in Tokyo, Japan.
Leonardo DiCaprio holds the Oscar for Best Actor for the movie “The Revenant”.
Actor Jackie Chan poses with his Honorary Award at the 8th Annual Governors Awards in Los Angeles, California, November 12, 2016.
President-elect Donald Trump and musician Kanye West pose for media at Trump Tower in New York.
The reproduction of Hogwarts Castle during the opening of “The Wizarding World of Harry Potter” attraction at Universal Studios Hollywood.
Singer George Michael seen here performing at a concert in Las Vegas in 1997, died on Dec 25.
Carrie Fisher at the premiere of “Star Wars The Force Awakens” died on Dec 27 aged 60.
The original judgesc Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul and Simon Cowell at the grand finale of the American Idol which ended after fifteen years.
Cast member Peter Dinklage attends the premiere for the sixth season of HBO’s “Game of Thrones” in Los Angeles
The world’s largest cruise ship, the 361 meters long, Harmony of the Seas, arrives in port for her maiden voyage, in Southampton, Britain
Soldiers stand n front of the flag draped coffin of former Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos during burial rites, who was given a state funeral after three decades.
A woman cries while holding up a portrait of Thailand’s King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who died in Bangkok aged 88.
Islam Karimov, the first president of Uzbekistan, seen here in 2012, died on September 2.
Harper Lee, author of bestseller “To Kill a Mockingbird,” is seen here in 2007. Lee died on Feb 19.
Emma Morano, thought to be the world’s oldest person and the last to be born in the 1800s, blows candles during her 117th birthday in Verbania, northern Italy .
Flowers lay around a bronze statue of a gorilla Harambe in Cincinnati Zoo who had to be shot dead after a boy tumbled into a moat on May 30.
A participant throws a piece of paper reading “Trump and Brexit” into a trash can to be shredded during “Good Riddance Day” in New York City. The day is an annual event held for people to shred pieces of paper representing their bad memories or things they want to get rid of before the New Year.
